Paideia: The Ideals of Greek Culture: Volume II: In Search of the Divine Center - Softcover

Jaeger, Werner; Highet, Gilbert

Softcover

ISBN 10: 0195040473 ISBN 13: 9780195040470

Publisher: Oxford University Press, 1986

Synopsis

Werner Jaeger's classic three-volume work, originally published in 1939, is now available in paperback. Paideia, the shaping of Greek character through a union of civilization, tradition, literature, and philosophy is the basis for Jaeger's evaluation of Hellenic culture.
Volume I describes the foundation, growth, and crisis of Greek culture during the archaic and classical epochs, ending with the collapse of the Athenian empire. The second and third volumes of the work deal with the intellectual history of ancient Greece in the Age of Plato, the 4th century B.C.--the age in which Greece lost everything that is valued in this world--state, power, liberty--but still clung to the concept of paideia. As its last great poet, Menander summarized the primary role of this ideal in Greek culture when he said: "The possession which no one can take away from man is paideia."

About this title

From the Back Cover:

The project of Greek culture in its heroic period was the creation of the perfect state-a goal that seemed within reach in the Athens of the fifth century B.C. But with the fall of Athens that prospect evaporated, and the result, which Werner Jaeger describes in this second volume of his magisterial three-volume study of Hellenism, was the spiritualizing of Greek culture-'the search for the divine centre.' Jaeger traces the growth of this new power in human culture from its early beginnings in the teachings of Socrates, to its natural climax in Plato's Republic.

About the Author:

Werner Jaeger is formerly of Harvard University and the Institute for Classical Studies.

About this edition

• Publisher: Oxford University Press
• Publication date: 1986
• ISBN 10: 0195040473
• ISBN 13: 9780195040470
• Binding: Paperback
• Edition number: 2
• Number of pages: 464